Fly Fishing Adventure in Guyana

By Dave Ulmer (slic)

It all started at 2:00 AM on March the 13th, 2002 from Cincinnati to Atlanta
to Miami to Trinidad, Tobago to Georgetown, Guyana, landing at
midnight - all on different airplanes. Guyana is in northern
South America, bordering the North Atlantic Ocean, between Suriname
and Venezuela. That's the Georgetown airport to the right above. The trip
was originally scheduled for last fall, but 9/11 occured and we rescheduled.
The two photos below show typical traffic in the outskirts of
Georgetown.

Monday, Peter Gorinski (Tropic) and I spent getting ready for the
first leg of the two week adventure.

On Monday I also met my host and hostess Tony and Estella, wonderful folks
and dedicated fly fishers.

On Tuesday Peter and I went to Ogel airport where we caught a plane to
Mabaruma, on Air Guyana. This flight took about one hour. Mabaruma is on the
northern border with Venezuela and we fished there for three days on Line
and Luri creeks for baby tarpon. We stayed at the Kumaka Guest House, shown
in photo 2.

The house in photo 8 (above) is typical of the homes in the back country.

We then returned to Georgetown, and spent the night again at Tony's
house. Peter, Tony, Estella, Bryan James and his daughter Samantha and I went
back to Ogle Airport to go to the Rupununi Savannah where we landed at
Lethem. That's the Lethem Airport above. Next we took trucks and
SUV's over a dirt road to Karanambo, this was about a six hour trip,
and a bit dusty until the rain came.

We stayed at Diane McTurk's Karanambo Lodge and went down the Rupununi
River to the Simoni Lakes. The top photos above are the 'houses' we
stayed in, and below them us making plans and getting ready for the
fishing there on the Pupununi River and the Semoni Lakes.

The next pictures are of the fish we caught on the Semoni Lakes,
along with two of our fishing companions.

Taking a break in the fishing, the first day out we caught over 80
fish. That's Peter in the left photo, me getting a drink on the right.

Check out the teeth on the fish Tony is holding! (below)

Laundry Day at the Karanamba Lodge.

We fished this area for 5 days, then flew back to Georgetown.

The following day Peter, Tony, Estella and I went to Tony's fishing camp
the Lukanami Lodge, where we fished the Abary Conservancy Lake for butterfly
peacock bass and the Abary River for juvenile tarpon. The photo on the
right is of Snowy Egrets on our way to Tony's lodge (below).

The photos above are black piranha at the Lukanami Lodge.
The one below is me in need of a good shave.

Last night, what a way to end a trip, could you ask for anything more?

The evening of the second day we went back to Georgetown and Tony's
house. The next morning at 3:00 AM I was off for home.

It was a great time with lots of different fish caught. Truely this
was my trip of a lifetime. ~ Dave Ulmer (slic)